One of our readers, Ken, attended the game and shared his perspective. He included some photos.

I am a Southern California boy living in Omaha, Nebraska while attending law school (just about finished, just one final to go!). Since Omaha is about a 6 hour drive to St. Louis, a fellow law student/puckhead and I decided to go down and go fucking nuts at the game. It was hot, muggy, and a very quiet atmosphere when we arrived, not at all like LA for game 3 vs the Canucks which I also attended. Downtown St. Louis was almost deserted. Got caught in a flash thunderstorm and got soaked on our way back to the arena from touring downtown but didn’t care a whit because we were about to experience playoff hockey.

We got to our seats (not bad huh?) and promptly threw down for our teams (unfortunately, my friend from law school is a damn Blues fan). The arena gradually filled up and looking around, I realized that there were about 12 Kings fans total besides myself in that entire arena. The Blues fans were loud and ready to go, and their team responded in kind. Right from the opening faceoff, Kopi’s line had an ok shift, then I started to get a little nervous. The Blues came to play it seemed, they looked faster, looked tougher, and were getting several quality shots. Quicky came up huge! Fans around me were starting to say things like “Quick really IS good isn’t he” to which my internal dialouge responded “No Shit, Sherlock!”. After a quality PK, the Kopi line came out and did work again, then the rest of the boys visibly started warming up, and you could feel the momentum start to come our way. Even after the Blues struck first, I was getting more and more confident, we were rolling shifts and our changes were faster and cleaner than the Blues. In fact they actually began to look visibly tired by the end of the first.

Now, my brothers tell me that I was on tv for every Kings goal as I was one of the only Kings fans there, was only 5 rows up off the glass and right at the goalline on the bench side where the Kings shot twice. Representin’ is all I have to say about that.

The crowd was a strange one, very late back to the seats, and many people actually left the game after the second intermission! Crazy. The Blues came out of the second intermission looking VERY flat, no energy. I was so proud of my Kings for not backing off when playing against a flat team. They came out strong, with a killer instinct, which gives me enormous confidence going foward. I made sure to sing out “I LOOOOOOOOOVE LA” as loudly as I possibly could on Penner’s goal to show the Blues Fans that LA Kings fans are passionate about their team. I felt amazing after the final horn sounded, headed to the bathroom innocously whistling “I Love LA”, and listend to delusional/drunk Blues fans saying things like: “No worries bro, we lost game 1 in the quarters too” and “Yeah, plus, we dominated them the whole game!” I couldn’t believe my ears, were we watching the same game? And finally, that scoreboard sure looked good at the end didn’t it?

“THN’s Take: In winning Game 1 of their first round upset of the first-place, top-seeded Vancouver Canucks, the Los Angeles Kings showed they deserved to be in the playoffs. And in winning Game 1 of their second-round showdown with the powerhouse Blues – beating St. Louis 3-1 at their own defense-obsessed game – California’s sole remaining team showed they deserved to be seen as a favorite to win the Stanley Cup.” –Proteau

Two comments:
Did it look like that puck sat there forever waiting for Greene? Well, it did. Brown took out Ellot with his stick.

On “Headcakes” Penner: “Pens, for a guy who probably catches a lot of … stuff … but when he’s on his game, he’s a pretty effective player,” Brown said. “Especially against a team like this. There’s not many guys WHEN HE WANTS TO PLAY that can probably match him physically.

You are not bright. He is in law school (he is not a lawyer) and he is not in L.A. Did you read his story? What do they teach you idiots at St. Louis U? Finger painting? And L.A.’s dick is in St. Louis’ ass after game one. We win the second one in your barn and we’ll find another orifice of yours to insert our game.